Restart Racing’s Chris Smiley admitted that he “didn’t throw everything at it” in pursuit of pole position in qualifying for the British Touring Car Championship at Oulton Park, having not expected Tom Ingram to be as quick as he was.
Smiley equalled his best-ever qualifying result in the BTCC, which he has achieved three times in the past, the most recent being back in 2019, by putting his car on the front-row of the grid alongside Ingram in Cheshire.
The 33-year-old, who had been fastest of all in second practice, missed out on pole position by almost half a second on Saturday afternoon, but was pleased with his result, nonetheless.
“I sailed through Q1 and Q2 no problem, but in Q3 I just wasn’t as sharp or as fast as I was in Q1,” explained Smiley to TouringCars.Net. “I kind of thought I would haven able to do a [time of] 1:24.0 in Q3, but I missed out due to little bit of track limits [exceedances] and a little bit of saving tyres for tomorrow.
“We didn’t throw everything at it for pole position. We didn’t think we needed to because of where we were with the boost, but obviously Tom has done an amazing lap without any boost there. It puts us in a great position for the three races tomorrow.
“I knew the feeling with the car after FP2 that we could have been on for that kind of result today and it would have been nice to get pole position.
“But starting on the front row puts us in a really good position for tomorrow, and we’ve got eight laps of boost for race one. I think that’s going to be a big help.
“I’ve been on the front row quite a few times, but I would have liked to be on pole.
“Typically, on Saturdays we’ve struggled to translate our FP2 pace into qualifying, and today we’ve been fast in all conditions, so I think it’s been a very solid day.
“I’m focussed on the Independents’ championship this year and anything else that comes on top of that is a bonus for us.
“That mindset is going to continue tomorrow.”